


come in from the edge (and let the good times roll)

by ghostoftonantzin



Category: What We Do in the Shadows (TV)
Genre: F/F, set post 2.08, very self-indulgent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-25
Updated: 2020-10-25
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:27:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27185873
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghostoftonantzin/pseuds/ghostoftonantzin
Summary: Karen gets everything she ever wanted.
Comments: 8
Kudos: 10





	come in from the edge (and let the good times roll)

**Author's Note:**

> I related to Karen's whole deal, and had a few long days recently, so I wrote a fix-it fic of sorts.
> 
> Title from Bert Jansch's "On the Edge of a Dream"

Karen is freezing. It’s about 2 a.m. on the kind of night where no one in their right mind would be out and about, it’s so cold out. One of the nights where going cruising for victims with her master would’ve been a lost cause from the get-go, not that she would have ever told her master that. Her feet feel like little needles are pricking them all over, and her concern about dying of hypothermia on a well-lit street in Staten Island is starting to take on the edge of panic. At least, if she doesn’t die of blood loss first.

She looks down at herself. The cuts she got when she slid down the tree outside the window aren’t too bad, but the gash on her arm is still bleeding steadily. It doesn’t look like enough to bleed out. So maybe she’ll die of a combination of blood loss and hypothermia.

She hasn’t seen anyone else, like at all. She’s not sure where to go. Her master definitely wouldn’t take her back now, always already annoyed at her most of the time before she’d left to work for another vampire. Best case scenario she bangs on some random door and then has to explain why she’s out in just a robe with no shoes on.

Fucking Celeste. Karen had nearly fallen out that window cleaning it and made for it when she saw her master and her friends bust down the door, after the screaming had started but before the screaming had really started. Being a familiar meant becoming kind of callous like that.

And she’d been so excited for the orgy too. Orgies weren’t the kind of thing that happened to her, though everyone else had seemed kind of ehhh on the whole idea. She’d even worn the underwear she’d been saving for a special occasion under her robe, and maybe someone would have even gone _wow_ when she would have disrobed. Maybe Guillermo or even Celeste. Imagine impressing a vampire like that.

Or not a vampire, anyway.

But they were white and lacy and not very supportive, in the cups, the kind that came in a box lined with tissue paper sealed with an embossed gold sticker. And no one would get to see it, and she’d never know if anyone had wanted to see it in the first place.

The orgy would have been a taste of what being a vampire would be like, all hedonism and uncomplicated desire. She could’ve looked over and someone would be looking over at her and the answer would already be yes.

Her father had always warned her to be careful around men, to guard her virtue because there were a lot of unscrupulous people looking to take advantage of good-natured young women like her. Then she’d moved to New York and discovered that wasn’t true, much to her disappointment.

“Excuse me. Are you lost?”

A car had pulled up beside her, and she hadn’t even noticed. Though when she looked again, it was the kind of two-door sports car that was much too expensive to make noise. Unless the driver wanted it to, she guessed. 

“No. Are you lost?” Karen replied before she could think of a better answer. They could be lost. Their car looked way too nice for this block of warehouses and semi-remodeled brownstones. Probably more of a Manhattan car, really. Two very attractive women were in the front seats. Karen knew attractive, from being around vampires for a few years and all.

“We’re not lost,” The woman driving looked like she was wearing a red wig, which was kind of a lot for driving around at two in the morning. Karen looked in the side mirror to see if the burn scars reached the other side of her face. She didn’t see a reflection. Huh. Must be too cold to fly.

“You’re vampires.” she blurts out.

The women look at each other.  
“That’s a funny thing to accuse a stranger of,” the vampire in the passenger seat says. “Two women driving around at night, and they must be vampires?” All of her teeth are very long and sharp, and she’s showing them to Karen, so the jig must be up.

“No, no, I’m a familiar. I was a familiar. I’ve seen vampires.” Karen says.

“So much for easy prey.” the vampire driving said, not to her.

“I’m easy! I’m easy prey.” Karen says. The vampires look at each other.

“She’s wearing nothing but a house robe in the middle of the night. Fucking ice cold. Come on, I bet some clubs are closing soon.” The cold violet light of the sky doesn’t reach into the car, leaving whatever the dashboard light doesn’t reach shadowed.

“I’m not just wearing a house robe, I’m wearing underwear too. See?” Karen pulls open her robe, more out of outrage at being dismissed again than any sort of logic, so she’s got her bra out in the middle of the night in front of a couple of vampires she’s never met.

Karen forgets about the cut on her arm, too late to stop blood from dripping onto the cup of her bra. Karen curses to herself in her mind. She’s getting blood all over her nice new underwear. Even if she washed it, the fabric probably wouldn’t be really clean anymore.

She looks back up, tries to make eye contact. But the vampire isn’t looking at her face, she’s looking down at her. And she doesn’t make eye contact when she finally stops looking, just twists around in her seat and looks at the vampire driving. They lock eyes for a second. Maybe they’re talking through the ether, some vampires are connected like that. They look connected, kind of like sisters.

Karen shifts from foot to foot. They’re progressed past pins and needles and into solid numbness by now.

The vampire finally looks at her. “You poor thing. You must be freezing out here.” Her voice sounds different now, lower and smoother. She opens the car door, and Karen backs up a little so it won’t hit her. Her legs are starting to numb a bit now, too.

There’s no backseat, and no middle seat between them. She’d have to sit on the passenger seat, in the lap of the vampire with the long brown hair and the long sharp teeth.

Karen gets in the car.


End file.
